Stephen Bounds — Fri, 13/03/2015 - 13:47

Image and Data Manager has published an excellent round-up and analysis of the recent revelation that Hillary Clinton chose to send and receive all of her emails while Secretary of State on a private server on her own domain.

Stephen Bounds — Sat, 22/02/2014 - 23:25

While reflecting on the exciting and invigorating experience of presenting a recordkeeping masterclass last Friday, an epiphany occurred. You can make a good case that the current records authority process for classifying and disposing of records is highly problematic because it mashes up to six different needs for recordkeeping into a single unholy mess:

Stephen Bounds — Sat, 15/06/2013 - 23:27

Email has been (and remains) the biggest thorn in the side of recordkeepers in modern organisations. For most people it consists of a mish-mash of routine work correspondence, significant collaboration efforts, records of critical decisions and sometimes even legally binding agreements – along with funny JPGs, invitations to lunch, and records of deeply personal non-work events.

This makes a email a serious and ongoing risk for organisations, potentially vital but also risky to access after staff members leave due to privacy concerns

Stephen Bounds — Thu, 30/05/2013 - 15:38

In a little over three months' time, the final mandatory Check-up submission will be sent by departments and agencies to the National Archives of Australia for collation and reporting to the Minister.

These Check-up surveys benchmark agencies against the minimum recordkeeping requirements they must achieve by 2015 to be compliant with the Digital Transition Policy. This digital transition requires a majority of records in agencies to be handled electronically, with a minimum of new paper records created.

Stephen Bounds — Wed, 29/05/2013 - 13:42

knowquestion is proud to launch a series of workshops focusing on practical solutions to organisational problems. While grounded in Information Management and Knowledge Management theory, the workshops aim to fill skills gaps which are critical in order to deliver useful, compliant information systems and productive organisational outcomes. Jargon will be kept to a minimum with a focus on transferring skills that can be immediately put into practice.

Running in July and August 2013, these workshops are essential for managers and staff committed to delivering value, and improving their professional skills and craft.

Stephen Bounds — Thu, 16/05/2013 - 13:12

In a capital city near you, in the near distant future ...

Pierre, Frieda and Walter are in AcmeCo's meeting room for an important contractual discussion. The red light of a CCTV blinks unobtrusively in the corner of the room, capturing every word and actions in 1080p HD video, with secondary lenses running OCR transcripts of every piece of text on every document displayed in the room. Walter, from BondCo, is wearing his Google Glass Neo fashion range, blue record light serenely notifying that he is streaming the conversation back to BondCo's cloud-based record bank.

The conversation is friendly, but occasionally a watcher from the present would be jarred by an odd turn of phrase. These special phrases are those which legal precedent has deemed to demonstrate that obligations of good faith are incurred or avoided.

Similar scenes are taking place in coffee shops and pubs all across the city between colleagues, friends, and family. For the most part, small talk becomes more measured; people know that anything might be recorded and reflected back on them at some point in the future. Others see the constantly recorded environment making pretence pointless, and embrace complete authenticity – as if daring people to ridicule their human foibles.

Stephen Bounds — Thu, 02/05/2013 - 15:38

As anyone who has ever had to deal with a government department or large corporation knows, a large proportion of requests need to be initiated by filling out a form. These can be paper, paper-analogue (ie PDF) or online forms.

The logic of having forms seems impeccable: By making it clear what the organisation needs to know upfront to complete the request, the need for back-and-forth correspondence can be eliminated, leading to more efficient service.

However forms have an unfortunate side-effect. The time taken by people to fill out and submit information is "free" from the perspective of the organisation receiving the forms. Therefore, there is a strong incentive to push as much effort as possible on to the submitter.